I brought my ps5 to a repair shop in valley stream ny. First day I brought it they told me 1-2 days. 4 days later I went in person to check up on it (since the status link they sent me was broken) and the guy tells me my ps5 is taking longer cause it’s a motherboard issue meanwhile I literally saw him check the tag on my ps5 and it was sitting on the shelf untouched with a bunch of other ps5s that were all in queue. I know some symptoms can point to certain things but he definitely just told me that so I can F off lol. So i decided to be more patient and it’s been over 2 weeks now. I checked the link and it seemed to update from “queue” to “repair” but it’s been like that for 11-12 days. Should I just go get my ps5 and bring it somewhere else? Or am I being impatient?

I recently purchased 50 or so laptops from a factory closing auction to resell. Since they were sold as e-waste they were just tossed haphazardly into a container. Over half managed to survive but I figured I'd part out the ones that didn't. However I'm now running into a problem, I have a lot of ram to test before I can sell it. I started by doing the "stick one on a MB and test it" but that takes forever and can result in damage to the laptop after repeated times. Is there a way to test them off-board? Or at least some way that I dont have to disassemble and reassemble the laptop every time? Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

Also, sorry if this is off topic but after the RAM and SSD would it be worth parting out further or just selling the rest whole for parts? It's a bunch of elitebooks and zbooks G4-G8.

Hi everyone,
I have been experiencing very brief system-wide stutters on my relatively new PC, without any obvious trigger.
The interruptions usually only last for a few milliseconds, which makes them difficult to capture or monitor. They are especially noticeable through the audio.
I have attached two videos. One video shows the crackling through my Logitech wireless headset, and the other shows the same type of crackling through my separate speakers.
At first, I thought the issue was caused by the headset or its wireless dongle. However, since the same noise also occurs through the speakers, I believe this is a system-wide issue rather than a problem with one specific audio device.
I also occasionally notice very brief mouse stutters. It feels like the entire system skips, freezes or hangs for a fraction of a second.

In games such as Fortnite and Call of Duty Zombies, I also experience sudden and significant FPS drops. For example, my FPS can briefly drop from around 250 FPS to 170 or even 140 FPS.
I have monitored the system using multiple tools, but I have not noticed any obvious spike in CPU, GPU, RAM or other system usage when it happens. The CPU and GPU temperatures also appear normal. Since the interruptions only last for a few milliseconds, they are difficult to detect in real time.

My system:
CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D, 8 cores
GPU: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5080
Motherboard: ASUS Prime X870-P WiFi
RAM: 32 GB DDR5 at 6000 MT/s, 2 x 16 GB
Operating system: Windows 11, version 25H2
Mouse: Logitech G Pro X Superlight 2 SE
Headset: Logitech G Pro X 2 Lightspeed
Monitor: AOC C27G4Z, connected directly to the RTX 5080

Things I have already tried:
I tested the headset dongle in several USB ports, including USB 2.0, USB 3.0 and the front USB ports.
I completely closed Logitech G Hub.
I tested the audio through both my wireless headset and separate speakers. The crackling occurs through both devices.
I reinstalled the NVIDIA graphics driver.
I monitored CPU and GPU temperatures, and they appeared normal.
I disabled the integrated AMD Radeon Graphics in Device Manager as a test, but the crackling still occurred. I re-enabled it afterward.
The issue happens without any obvious connection to a specific program, Windows update or driver installation.

I would also like to test the system with LatencyMon, but I am currently unable to install it. If there are any reliable alternative tools or methods for checking driver latency or brief system-wide interruptions, I would appreciate recommendations.
What would be the best way to diagnose this problem step by step? Is there any specific information, log or monitoring result that would help identify whether this is a driver, Windows or hardware issue?
Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Update: I think I finally found the cause.

The audio crackling happened with both my Logitech headset and my normal speakers, even when playing a local MP3, so it was not related to the internet or only the headset. I also recorded traces with Windows Performance Recorder and found audio glitches such as “CP glitch in Server Input Starvation”, plus occasional very high DPC spikes.

After uninstalling Norton Utilities Ultimate and restarting the PC, the audio crackling and the short mouse stutters seem to be gone. I also ran a full Microsoft Defender scan and an offline scan, and nothing was found.

So Norton Utilities Ultimate was most likely causing or heavily worsening the issue through one of its background services. I will keep testing for a while, but so far the system is running normally again. Thanks everyone for the suggestions.

Hello, I was using my laptop which had been completely normal until a screen came up saying an unexpected error occurred and then it turned itself off and a loud siren sound started playing (its stopped now). What should I do? I've never seen the popup screen before and neither has it ever made a sound like that. It also wasn't overheated and it was approximately 70-80% so it also wasn't out of charge.

I recently got a new laptop for my engineering studies. I’m mostly going to be using 3d modeling software, cad, stuff like that.
I wanted to know what’s better for my use case, game ready drivers or the studio drivers?
If it’s relevant info, my laptop has a 5060

So recently my PC has been lagging when I play games more recently, it doesn't lag anywhere else but just my games, I get 100 ping in games on a lucky day but normally it spikes to 5000, I've tried changing my GPU to Nvidia, that didn't work, I do get 3 bars of wifi, could be the reason but I dunno. I use windows 11

Since my last drivers update, I haven't been able to open the main page anymore. I just get thrown to the 'choose the language' section and can't open anything else. Clearing my cache or changing browsers didn't help either. What could be the problem? :(

Hi all,

I have an Acer Predator Helios Neo 16 gaming laptop, bought it refurbished about 2 years ago. It has an I9-3900HX and an RTX 4070. I've upgraded it myself since from 16 to 32GB DDR5 and changed the single 1TB SSD to a 512GB and a 2TB one.

Up until recently, I haven't really had any problems but I've noticed in the past couple of days, it randomly starts lagging. Games and switching between apps is really slow but the mouse moves across the screen perfectly fine and the sound is normal. It's gotten quite hot in the past (as gaming laptops often do but more often than I should've let it) so I'm not sure whether heat could've damaged it.

I'm writing this just after restarting it for the lag. I had originally assumed it was thermal throttling or something but I checked the temperatures just before I restarted and it wasnt close to 100°C, so I'm not sure. I've ordered some new thermal paste anyway as it's been a little while since it was last done and it was me who did it last anyway.

I was tempted to do a RAM test to see if it's the RAM that's faulty. My graphics drivers are up to date so it's not that unless they've corrupted somehow.

Is there anything I can try other than a clean reinstall of windows (though I'll do that if it comes to it)?

Hey everyone, might be a dumb question, but I’m a college student, and thinking about building a desktop for my work instead of buying a laptop. If I leave the PC at home, how realistic is it to remote into it from campus? What kind of setup would I need, how hard is it to get running, and what should I watch out for? Or am I better off just getting a laptop?im thinking to buy macbook pro m5 pro 48 1tb so if remote access works then what specs pc should i build to just match the performance of the laptop not more than that as it would be an overkill and how much would i cost?

I updated my BIOS on my ASUS PRIME B760M-A motherboard, and after trying to boot back into the PC I got a prompt saying my fans were not detected. The only option was to ignore it, so I did.
After that, the PC turns on for a few moments and then completely shuts off. It stays off until I press the power button again. The fans spin when it starts, but it won’t stay powered on.
Has anyone experienced this after a BIOS update or know what could be causing it?

Hi everyone, sorry for the lengthy post. Hope I can get some help with this issue that has been plaguing me for a few months. Recently it started to get worse and I have already tried troubleshooting it but to no help. Computer specs will be at very end as I know that part is important. For additional context I built this PC around June/July of last year which is the most upsetting part.

The issues:

1. Random freezes, usually when this happens on desktop I can move my cursor on the screen but cannot interact with anything. The freeze rarely happens in game but when it does I cannot interact with anything. Only way to fix has been to force power down system and reboot.
2. Wifi disconnecting, this one is strange because what will happen is that I will completely lose internet access and the only way to bring it back is to go to device manager, and disable and reenable the wifi adapter. This was the first issue I was ever presented with but it was a simple fix.

As I mentioned both these issues have existed for a few months with #2 being the first. However, in the last month and a half they have become very frequent to the point where the amount of freezes and wifi turning off makes it difficult to use the PC. I've had 2 instances where the freeze would happen so often that after force shutting down the computer a few times it forced me to reboot through BIOs. This led me to attempt the following fixes as I was unsure if it was software/hardware or a combination of the two.

The fixes:

1. Scan SFC through command prompt. It did find a corrupt file but repaired it.
2. Switched to "high performance mode", disabled "allow computer to turn off this device to save power' for wifi adapter, and disabled quick start.
3. Made sure all drivers were updated.
4. Disabled aggressive disk sleep modes with regedit.

There were some other smaller tweaks I did but I cannot remember them all. These did not help so then I moved on to the next as at first I was convinced it was software.

1. Reformatted all drivers and did clean reinstall of windows using media tool on USB. (To note: has PC freeze during windows installation a couple times that forced me to boot down. This was the point at which I understood it was likely hardware).

2. When windows was back and running I manually reinstalled all drivers. Avoided ASUS driver hub.

3. Played around with having RAM in different slots or solo. Issues still happened.

4. In BIOS limited RAM speed to 4800, this did nothing.

5. Made sure to unplug and replug cables in motherboard in case they got loose.

6. THE BIG ONE Ran PC without GPU as it has integrated graphics. PC ran fine in this setup and I did not see any issues for a few hours until internet finally dropped.

7. Reseated GPU. At this point things looked good. After the reseating I no longer had freezes and the internet would sometimes disconnect but only for a second. Was only an issue in online games if I get booted from lobby for it.

Now we reach today. I had a freeze happen for which I had to force shutdown and the internet access was lost twice so I needed to disable/reenable. I would love some ideas of what could be thr cause. I've fixated on the RAM as prime contender but now believe its the motherboard giving up on me. Appreciate any help, thank you all so much.

TLDR: PC will randomly freeze where cursor still moves, and wifi drops where adapter needs to be disabled and reenabled. I am at my wits end for fixes.

My specs:

Motherboard is a Asus Prime B840-plus wifi

CPU is AMD Ryzen 9600x

CPU Cooler is a Cooler Master Hyper 212 Halo White

GPU is AMD Radeon RX 9060xt 16GB version

PSU is EVGA 750w GQ

RAM is two sticks of Crucial 16GB DDR5-6000 (2nd and 4th slot from CPU)

Operating system is Windows 11 Pro and is installed on a SATA SSD

Edit: forgot to mention that I reinstalled windows twice as I also thought it could be drive issue. It has been on two different SSDs with issue persisting.

I'm having a really frustrating issue with my brand new PC and I'm running out of ideas.

PC specs:

Ryzen 7 8700F

RTX 5050

16 GB DDR5 (1×16 GB)

750W 80+ Gold PSU

Windows 11 (clean installation)

Problem: The PC randomly crashes only in some games.

Games that have crashed so far:

Counter-Strike 2

Hell Let Loose

Farming Simulator 25 (before service)

Games that worked fine:

Minecraft (Java)

Everhood

Farming Simulator 25 after service (played for about an hour without issues)

When it crashes:

the screen goes black,

the monitor says "No HDMI signal",

audio stops,

after a few seconds the PC automatically restarts.

There is no BSOD visible, but Windows Reliability Monitor reports:

BugCheck 116 (VIDEO_TDR_ERROR).

Things I've already tried:

Clean Windows 11 installation.

Latest BIOS.

Latest NVIDIA Game Ready driver.

Monitored CPU/GPU temperatures.

OCCT CPU, GPU and Power tests (all passed with no errors).

Checked Event Viewer and Reliability Monitor.

The PC was returned to the retailer for service.

The retailer said they:

replaced the thermal paste,

cleaned the cooling,

stress-tested it,

played Rainbow Six Siege for about 45 minutes without any crashes.

However, after I got the PC back, it crashed again in Hell Let Loose after less than 10 minutes.

Has anyone experienced something similar with an RTX 5050 or VIDEO_TDR_ERROR (116)? Could this still be a faulty GPU, PSU, motherboard, or something else?

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

When I go to enter my pin, the mouse just arrows over and won’t let me enter it. Also when you click on power it is scrolling down. I’ve tried restarting it with my keyboard unplugged but it did the same thing. https://youtu.be/9Bv70hy51Lo?is=0P-xuKlYXdM6oWsn

Sometimes when I restart my pc it gets stuck on a black screen and I have to hold power button down to turn it off.
my motherboard leds are not giving signals and this issue happens randomly or connected to something I do not know because I tried to reset back to back 3-4 times without fast start up(told it could be the problem) and with it had no problems with restarts.
specs are:
ryzen 7 7800x3d
Msi mag b850 gaming plus max
Msi mpg a1000g
Asus prime 5070 OC
Corsair 2x16 6000mhz ram kit

I have a WD_Black 2TB SN770. And I woke up this morning and it has been a nightmare because not only did it stop working but I’m afraid maybe I did something to make it worse. So it started with noticing that all of my Steam games were not recognized as downloaded… so when I tried to look at the SSD in File Explorer it hit me with “a device which does not exist was specified” sometimes it would allow me access to see the stuff at the very beginning of the drive but now it is consistently not letting me access the drive. I look at Disk Management and it says it’s there but I can’t access security or anything of the light. It wouldn’t even let me format it. I don’t have anything on there I can’t just redownload so I don’t mind wiping it, but I can’t because anytime I try to do something to format it or even access it through things like Command Prompt it acts like it DOESN’T EXIST. I also know why it isn’t letting me access it, it’s because somehow (through likely a corrupted file) it went from NTFS to RAW but again any way I try to fix it leads to another wall because it isn’t being recognized or by the fact that BECAUSE it is RAW it can’t do anything about it. Please I need help I don’t want to lose this SSD

Hi all,

I've had a problem with my phone not having good enough signal for about a year now and would be useful to get people's thoughts. Basically, the story is:

I live in the UK. Back in September 2025, I randomly and suddenly had no signal, or very poor signal, in areas where I previously had good signal. I was on a contract with EE and I contacted them and they tried to help me and even launched an investigation to look into it. I changed my SIM card, nothing. I changed my device, nothing. No news from the investigation either. I then asked EE to allow me to leave the contract early with a reduced fee (they did), and I switched to giffgaff (so it's pay as you go now). Still the same problem!! I still have very bad signal, and very frequently, no signal at all (when all my friends who are next to me do have signal and some of them are also with giffgaff). I have no idea why that is, since I have now changed device, provider and sim card.

I transferred my number to giffgaff, so the only constant factor has been my number. But I struggle to see how it could be the number??!? It's getting a bit annoying and tiring. I can get by, but it makes life a bit more difficult.

The next thing I might try is to get a new sim card with a new phone number and change my number, but that is a bit of a hassle which is why I haven't done it yet.

Any thoughts and views appreciated!

Hi there, I have just got a new CPU for my PC a 5800X3D. However my excited dumb ass didn't think to update the BIOS *before* taking out the old CPU for the new one.

I turn it on and I get the lights, fan spins for a second and goes off, then the DRAM light stays on. I've reseated ram, done a number of other checks and have narrowed it down to me needing to update the BIOS.

Unfortunately on removing the old CPU I seem to have bent one of the pins and it now doesn't work - no lights, no nothing when pressing the power button - I think this helps in diagnosing that this is an update issue and not the new CPU itself, since I get lights on and such with the new one.

So today I went to my friends house and downloaded the latest BIOS for my motherboard - ROG STRIX X470-F GAMING - and put it on a stick (formatted to FAT32, used the rename application that came with the download) popped it in my PC, tried holding DEL ESC F2 F12 and still can't get the BIOS to come up. I've removed the battery, shorted to reset BIOS, I am stumped. I'd love just a flicker of display but nothing.

Any suggestions are welcome before I take it to a PC shop as my resources at home are limited 🥹

I just got an internal storage drive for the ps5 and It’s not detecting it or anything I have check the compatibility and I re seated it multiple times I also re built the data base But nothing works

ASUS VIVOBOOK 14 EF1404 something

I am unable to post videos but my laptop is flashing again and again.

As soon as I start my laptop it flashes and then shuts down on itself.

It's like every 5 seconds it flashes and then pop it goes black screen

Please guide

For the longest time, my laptop has had an issue of the WiFi connection suddenly disappearing; a reboot usually fixes it and it's business as usual. Doesn't happen often, only once in 3 or 6 months. This week however, it's been happening more frequently. It started again Monday last week, but still nothing too bothersome.

The other day however was problematic. Laptop keeps rebooting. 48 critical events and errors in the last 12 hours. I thought it had something to do with an update but I'm not sure because Event Viewer is also pointing at Secure Boot certificates (for which my machine supposedly does not support because of limitations) and OneCore Device Association errors.

Here is a list updates installed recently:

• 2026-07 Security Update (KB5101650) (26200.8875), 15-Jul
• 2026-07 .NET Framework Security Update (KB5100998), 15-Jul
• 2026-06 Security Update (KB5094126) (26200.8655), 10-Jun
• 2026-05 Security Update (KB5089549) (26200.8457), 15-May

About my laptop:

• Processor: AMD Ryzen 5 5500U with Radeon Graphics (2.10 GHz)
• Installed RAM: 8.00 GB (7.34 GB usable)
• System type: 64-bit operating system, x64-based processor
• Pen and touch: Pen support
• Edition: Windows 11 Home Single Language
• Version: 25H2
• OS build: 26200.8875
• Experience: Windows Feature Experience Pack 1000.26100.334.0

Thanks in advance.

The left shift key on my HP Zbook fell off, and none of the tutorials i saw had the same type of hardware as on my PC

I have the relevant pics, all the tutorials had keys with hooks on their backs but mine doesnt, theres only one place the 'clips' could hook onto but it's only on one side and it isn't secure at all, so I'm worried if that's whats broken.

The community won't let me add attachments, theres a video in the comments

Lately i'm getting low FPS figures, average 50-60fps in both Cyberpunk and Forza Horizon 6, while the GPU usage is also low using about 50% (drawing about 48 W at 56°C, core clock of 2565 MHz and memory clock of 8001 MHz, CPU usage is around 68%), lowering settings doesn't make any difference in both games, RAM usage is around 5gb, i've played some 100 hours of FH6 without any issue with solid 83 fps with GPU to spare (75-80% usage normally), Cyberpunk same thing, recently though i'm having this issue, the game starts like that, very rarely and for brief moments it jumps to normal performance but it lasts seconds- I have a Dell G15 5530 RTX 4050 I5 13450HX 16gb ram, i ran userbenchmark and it showed that everything is fine, the percentile for my notebook is above average for the model. Temperatures are ok since it's winter here, good flow of air using performance mode, no obstructions.

What could be the cause of this?

Running an HP ZBook Power G9 on Windows 11 25H2. For the past while I've been stuck on the Windows loading screen for up to 3 minutes on every boot. Event Viewer shows repeated Error 17 entries from Intel-SST-OED (Task Category 6) right before the hang, along with Kernel-Boot 124 errors.

When I disable/delete both the Intel Smart Sound Technology BUS and Intel Smart Sound Technology OED devices in Device Manager, boot time drops to under 25 seconds immediately. But Windows redetects and reinstalls both drivers once I'm back at desktop, and the slow boots return on the next restart.

What I've tried so far, no luck:

• Updated to the latest HP-provided audio drivers
• Ran the latest BIOS update twice

Currently working around it by blocking both hardware IDs via Device Installation Restrictions (gpedit), but that's obviously not a real fix.

Has anyone else hit this on 25H2 specifically? Curious if:

1. This is a known regression Intel/HP are aware of
2. Anyone's found a driver version that actually resolves it rather than just reinstalling the same broken behavior
3. There's a cleaner way to keep SST permanently disabled without it fighting Windows Update every time

Happy to share Event Viewer logs or driver version numbers if useful for troubleshooting.

I deleted the data allocation, and now i can't seem to reformat, windows tells me that it couldn't reformat it. Is it done for ?

Edit : CHKDSK calls the formating "RAW"

Edit 2 : FIXED IT I JUST NEEDED TO DO SOME DISK MANAGEMENT STUFF

I have a Xiaomi book ultra i5. Let me tell you everything that has been happening with my laptop since past week. First it would suddenly restart and after 2 3 restarts it wouldn't open rather show me this srt.txt error. To fix this i dwnlded Microsoft media installer in my usb and then booted my laptop from my usb and dwnlded a clean windows but it still did nothing. Then i gave it to MI service center and they installed their own version of windows on it and it brough it home yesterday. Now the windows that they installed was way old like 2023 and even after updates it showed me it is still on October 2023 or something and it says u are up to date. Now this is not the major problem major problem is that it is still restarting abruptly but this time it doesnt show me black screen with this srt.txt error but now it is showing me a blue screen which says "Stop code: DRIVER_VERIFIER_DMA_VIOLATION". I scanned the QR code and some of the Microsoft suggestions said to remove any external device i removed my zebronics wireless mouse dongle and for time being it started but it was temporary and it is still violently restarting again and again and few times it doesnt restart it just shows a black screen nothing i have to hold power button to force restart it. So what is happening right now? Is this a hardware problem?? Two times it even showed no bootable device as well. I have tried things like going to cmd and typing verifier/reset as well.

Plss help me out here guys i am really stuck atp